


Screaming 'cause we got it too good to cry

by Multifandom_damnation



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Bathing/Washing, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Dynamics, Gen, Protective Klaus Hargreeves, Sibling Love, Talking To Dead People, Touch-Starved, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Vanya Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Why Did I Write This?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:46:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25088650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Multifandom_damnation/pseuds/Multifandom_damnation
Summary: The act of sitting in a bathtub filled with now-cold water and trying to forget about your past sins was something Klaus knew deeply and intimately, and he also knows that there is always a reason to it.So when he finds Vanya in the exact same position that he normally finds himself in at one in the morning high off his ass, Klaus is determined to get to the bottom of it, even if he has to tear the whole world apart to get his answers.
Relationships: Klaus Hargreeves & Vanya Hargreeves
Comments: 16
Kudos: 434
Collections: Fave The Umbrella Academy, The Umbrella Academy





	Screaming 'cause we got it too good to cry

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why I wrote this. There was no need for me to write this. But because season 2 is coming out at the end of the month (yay!!) my mum wanted to rewatch the final two episodes of season 1 so she could remember what happened in time to start the second season and you guys? I forgot how much the bathtub scene with Vanya impacted me?? It was such a raw, heart-breaking scene that I just needed to write something about it before it drove me crazy, so that's why bathing/washing is a tag because she's in a bathtub. She and Klaus tend to be in baths a lot, huh? Maybe not a lot. But compared to the others? A fucktonne.
> 
> Also, I was actually so sick of making Luther the bad guy in my fics just because I needed someone to be the confrontation/conflict in the situation, because other than what he did to Vanya in the last two episodes and how he went on about the moon and old man Reggie, I actually really liked his character?? So this time, Allison is the bad guy, and Luther is the tired old dude trying to hold the family together with sticky tape. Not, like THE BAD GUY as in EVIL BITCH but she had a slip-up, a little boo-boo and she has to apologize. That's all! This didn't turn out exactly how I wanted it to and some points weren't touched on, but I like how it ended anyway. But honestly, I really loved writing for the Umbrella Academy and it's been so long since I've had the inspiration for a new fic, so I hope you enjoy this (and maybe a few more? I don't know. No promises) before the new season comes out.

While it was unusual to find the whole family seated around the dining table, waiting for lunch to start, Grace had insisted and had spent all morning preparing a meal for them, hearty and well-rounded and delicious in all dimensions. The most unusual thing of all was that everyone was seated, impatiently waiting, while Vanya was nowhere to be seen.

Ben anxiously watched the stairs. “Where is she?” he muttered, and Klaus shrugged in response from where he sat in his designated seat with his arms folded over his head, his forehead on the table. “It’s not like her to be so late like this.”

Apparently, Diego agreed, and he sunk deeper into his chair as he groaned. “Can we just start without her? We don’t know what she’s doing or how long it’ll take, and I’m fucking starving. Let’s eat.”

“No,” Luther said sternly, reaching out and resting his large hand over Diego’s as he tried to grab for a plate. “We eat as a family. We’ll wait for her.”

“When did you develop such noble sensibilities?” Diego snapped. Luther scowled at him and took his hand away, and Diego snatched it back.

“She better hurry up, whatever she’s doing,” Five mumbled over his third cup of shitty coffee for the day. “I’m growing impatient. This whole ordeal has been a massive waste of time.”

Luther sighed, so heavily that his whole form seemed to shift. “Just give her a little more time.”

“Fuck that,” Diego snapped as he stood up so fast that his chair skidded backwards a little before he marched to the stairs. Ben had to move out of the way to let him pass, making an ugly face at the back of his head.

“Don’t be so dramatic, Diego,” Allison sighed where she was checking the news on her phone, occasionally frowning at the tabloids that were recommended to her. “She probably just forgot, or just lost track of time. I know I would. No offence, but this kind of family bonding, get-together stuff isn’t exactly on the top of my to-do list.”

Ignoring her, Diego held onto the banister and called up the stairs, “Vanya! Hurry up! Some of us are starving and have to wait for you to get here before we can eat, so come down and put your ass on a seat!”

When he received no response, Diego returned to his seat in a huff and crossed his arms over his chest. “Feeling better?” Luther asked sarcastically.

“No,” Diego grumbled. “But I know that if she doesn’t get down here soon, I’m not going to wait for her anymore. I’ll give her five more minutes.”

“You’re so impatient,” Luther mumbled. 

“Hey wiseguy, not everyone has the privilege of eating three meals a day,” Diego shot back. “I haven’t eaten since breakfast two days ago, and that’s only because I came here and mum practically force-fed me before I sat down.”

As if she were summoned, Grace delicately made her way around the table, arms laden with trays of heavy food that would ordinarily be a hassle for any normal person, and began laying them out on the table. “Come on, children,” she said pleasantly. “You don’t want your meal to get cold.”

“See?” Diego waved at her as if she proved his point as he reached for one of the trays. “Even m-mum says we should start without her.”

“Ah!” Luther slapped his hand away, maybe a little harder than was necessary, and Diego recoiled with a growl. “What’s wrong with you? You’re a fucking animal, you know that?”

“Oh, that’s _rich_ coming from you,” Diego replied.

Grace sighed as she stood with her hands folded across her torso as she shook her head at their antics. “No fighting at the table, children. You can go outside if you want to do that.”

“Oh for the-” Five slammed his empty mug down on the table and stood. “Fine. I’ll go and get her if only that’ll stop your ceaseless yammering.” 

Ben, listening to the conversation and not liking what he was hearing, elbowed Klaus in the side. “Klaus. Be useful for once.” When he received no reaction, he rolled his eyes and whacked Klaus in the back of the head so hard that his forehead made a loud sound where it impacted against the table. “Get up Klaus!”

Klaus snapped his head up, rubbing at the red spot on his forehead, and said, rather hurriedly, “I’ll go get her!” he insisted and cleared his throat when it came out wrong. “I mean, don’t worry yourselves with going all the way up the stairs to knock on her door or whatever. We’ll have a better chance of figuring out what’s wrong if I were the one to ask.”

“You?” Allison actually looked up from her phone long enough to raise her eyebrows at him. “What makes you think that she’d actually talk to you?”

As Klaus slowly stood up from his seat, he folded his arms like he was bowing at his siblings. “Because, unlike you assholes, Vanya actually likes me,” before he turned on his heel and flounced towards the stairs, ignoring Allison’s offended scoff and Diego’s sniggering. Ben stayed behind to stick his tongue out at Allison and give Five the bird before he followed Klaus up the stairs to the second floor.

The floor of the mansion that homed the bedrooms of the Umbrella Academy was an unfortunate issue, with the detailed demonstrations of both defensive and offensive techniques pinned to the walls, and the bedrooms that were laden heavy with bad memories. Klaus only stayed in his room because it was necessary. He would much better prefer sleeping on the couch if anyone would allow it, but apparently only Ben could stand Klaus sleeping in his pink leopard print underwear. 

He paused outside Ben’s room as he passed it. He hadn’t been in there for a very long time, and neither had Ben, considering he’d been dead longer than he’d been alive. He almost asked him if he missed it, but glancing over his shoulder to where Ben was hovering, he saw the way that his face was twisted up in contempt, though his eyes held something akin to sadness. Klaus decided not to comment, and instead, he moved on from the room, leaving the door slightly ajar in case Ben wanted to have a look a little later. 

The hallway had always been lonely, despite it being lined with doors that led into the bedrooms of a family, a unit, a team, but it had never felt like that. In his older years, Klaus decided that they had always felt like a cellblock, and each bedroom was a neighbouring cell with a prisoner inside, banging their head on the walls and tugging at the bars and screaming into the ether for someone, anyone to hear them. Klaus would have been happy if he never had to set foot in this house ever again, but the old man just had to go and die, didn’t he?

He came to a stop at Vanya’s door, as impartial and unyielding as the others. He’d never actually had any reason to stand before Vanya’s door, and so he hesitated to knock. What would he find inside? Was it as average and minimalistic as her cozy little second-floor apartment? Or was it filled with memories of her childhood like everyone else’s was? Did she even have a childhood that allowed her to decorate her room? Klaus wouldn’t know. He hadn’t paid much attention to her back then.

Ben nudged him gently from behind. “Go on,” he urged. “Just knock. It’s only Vanya.”

 _Sweet little Vanya with a heart too big for her own good and a pang of sadness that rivals my own,_ Klaus thought, rather poetically if he might add, before he raised a fist to the wood and knocked on the door. The sound echoed through the room, but there was no response. “Vanya? Are you in there? No offence, darling sister of mine, but you’re taking a terribly long time in there. If you need help picking out an outfit for lunch, all you had to do was ask. But Diego and Five are getting… testy. And you know how that ends. So how about we hurry it up a little bit now, huh?”

When there was a surprising lack of response, Klaus turned to Ben with an incredulous expression. Ben merely shrugged. “Maybe… you were to abrupt? I don’t know. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with that but… maybe say please?”

“Please come down?” Klaus tried, spinning back to face the door. “Please? My pint-sized sister, who I love and cherish? I beg of you?”

“Alright, now you just sound desperate,” Ben said.

“I _am_ desperate,” Klaus hissed. “If I don’t come down with her soon, Diego is going to take a knife to Luther and resort to cannibalism, and Five probably won’t be too far behind him.”

“Just ask her nicely,” Ben insisted. “There’s gotta be a reason why she’s up here, right?”

“I can’t get any nicer! I-” he paused when he heard a sound from a different door in the long, endless hallway, and both he and Ben turned around to face the bathroom, where soft light was spilling into the hallway underneath the door, and Klaus made his way over to it slowly, tentatively, and placed his ear up against it. Then he heard it again, louder this time, and much clearer- the soft sound of gently splashing water. “Vanya? Are you in there? Are you decent? Would you mind too much if I came in?”

He didn’t receive an answer and after a full two minutes of waiting in silence, Ben said, “Go in,” and Klaus couldn’t wait any longer, so he quietly turned the handle and pushed his way into the room.

The bathroom was lit from the lamp in the far corner, and Klaus watched his reflection in the mirror as he entered the room and shut the door behind him. Vanya sat in the bath, legs folded up to her chest, her arms wrapped around her legs, her chin on her knees, staring unseeingly into the distance. She didn’t even seem like she heard Klaus’s entrance. And by her shoulders, running his hands up and down her arms and trying to run his fingers through her hair, was the ghost of Leonard Peabody, and Klaus felt sick at the sight of him, still missing an eye, still with the innumerable knives that stuck from his torso like porcupine quills. While Vanya didn’t acknowledge them, Leonard looked up from his ministrations and smirked at them, a victorious glint in his eye.

It took all of his willpower to ignore him, but Klaus made his way around to the side of the bath and knelt down on the ground. “Vanya?” he asked gently as he reached out and placed his hand on her arm. “Can you hear me? Are you alright?”

She didn’t turn to look at him at all, but Klaus knew she was listening when she let out a shaky breath. “Klaus?”

“Yes, dear?” Klaus asked. Her voice was so quiet that he shimmied closer to hear her. “What is it?”

“What are you doing here?”

She sounded so confused that his heart just broke for her. Ben perched on the basin, one leg tucked beneath him. He kicked the stood over from underneath the sink, and Klaus pulled it closer so he could sit on it instead of kneeling on the wet tiles. “I came looking for you, of course,” Klaus laughed lightly like it was obvious. “We had plans for lunch. You must have forgotten, but that’s alright because watching Diego moan about how hungry he is while he tries not to kill Luther is always entertaining.”

Vanya frowned, and this time she did turn to look at him, and Klaus wanted to jump into the bath with her and wrap her in a tight hug and never let her go for as long as he lived. He still might. “You… you guys waited for me? I thought you would have… started without me.”

“Of course we waited for you, Vanya!” Klaus said. “Luther’s determined for us to eat as a family for once, but either way, you’re still our sister. We weren’t going to just forget you existed so we could start lunch a little earlier.”

“You’ve done it before, you know. Forgotten about me,” Vanya said, and Klaus flinched. “But that’s alright. You guys are only human. I can’t blame you.”

“Look, Vanya, human or not, we never should have let that happen, especially not to you. And I’m sorry for the part I played in that. But things are going to be different now, alright?” Klaus glanced behind her again and watched as Leonard rested his chin on Vanya’s crown, and looked at Klaus over her hair with satisfaction in his eyes. “Can I ask you a deeply personal question?”

“Uh,” Vanya blinked. “Sure?”

“Did you kill Leondad Peabody?” He asked, and he watched both Vanya and Leonard recoil at his words. “It’s alright if you did. Actually, I’d be so proud of you if you did, but it’s kind of important, and I need to know.”

At first, Vanya didn’t reply, and just when Klaus thought she’d never answer, she lowered her head so her face was hidden by her hair and whispered, “Yes. I killed him. He lied to me. He never loved me, he loved what I could do. He used me. He needed to pay”

“Fantastic, I’m so- stop that!” He snapped when Leonard began kissing the back of her neck. Vanya flinched at the sharpness of his tone. “Not you, Vanya dear, you’re amazing and wonderful and brilliant in every way, but you- you _prick-_ get lost!”

Vanya’s eyes widened as she started to understand. “Klaus? Who is it? Who’s here?”

 _“She loves me!”_ Leonard hissed at the same time.

“Are you sure about that? Is that why she killed you? Because she loves you?” Klaus scoffed. Vanya had waded over to the other side of the bath and she reached for Klaus with shaking hands. Klaus moved so he could wrap his arms around her and she could fist her fingers in the fabric of his shirt. Wet or not, he was going to hold her for as long as she needed. “That doesn’t look like love to me, dick bag. Fuck off.”

Leonard didn’t look about to comply, so Ben stood up from where he had set up camp on the basin and walked over and punched Leonard’s ghost so hard in the face that he rocked back and his head smashed into the wall behind him. The blood on the tiles would have been a satisying result if he had been human, but the clean wall was just anticlimatic. “Klaus,” Ben’s voice was tense and thick, and his fists were clenched at his side “Let me take him. Please, let me take him away.”

Klaus wiggled his fingers in a dismissing sort of gesture. “Do your thing, Ben. I’d rather it be you than me.”

Ben’s eyes flared as he reached down and grabbed Leonard by the shoulders. Leonard screamed as Ben’s chest started to open into the gaping maw that Klaus remembered from childhood, and suddenly, they both vanished, banished to whatever place ghosts went when they weren’t bothering Klaus. Ben would be back, though. He was only… _escorting_ Leonards ghost. Or whatever was left of him.

“Klaus?” He had almost forgotten Vanya clutching onto him for dear life and ruining his favourite shirt, and he reached up to rest a hand on the back of her head. “What’s happening?”

“Nothing, doll,” Klaus said. “Leonard was here, but Ben’s going to take care of him. You’ve got nothing to worry about. Oh, also, this might tickle your fancy, but Ben punched him in the face. It was impressive, actually. He won’t be bothering you again.”

Slowly, incrementally, Vanya began to relax against Klaus, but to his joy, she didn’t pull away and instead rested her head on his shoulder. “Thanks, Klaus.”

“It’s the least I can do for my favourite sister,” he said as he gently ran his fingers through her wet hair. “It’s just you and me now, Vanya. No Ben, no Leonard, no siblings. You and me. Do you want to tell me what you’re doing in here like this?”

For once in his life, Klaus implemented his least developed skill, and waited patiently for Vanya to answer, and was pleasantly surprised when she actually did. “Do you think I’m a monster?” 

“What- _you_? A monster?” Klaus couldn’t understand what he was hearing. “No way Jose. Out of the seven of us, you’re the least monstrous. You’re kind, and you're gentle, and you care about everyone, even when they really don’t deserve it. You’re too hard on yourself, and maybe that’s our fault, and I’m sorry. But you’re not a monster. Nowhere near it. Why? What’s made you think that?”

“Nothing,” Vanya said and tried weakly to pull away. “Don’t worry about it. Forget that I asked, alright? Tell the others that I’ll be down soon.”

“Hold up, you can’t do that to me,” Klaus said. “To me, of all people. You’re favourite brother, who you love and adore,” Vanya smiled. “You have to tell me. Please? Pretty please? Pretty please with cherries and whipped cream on top?”

Vanya huffed out a laugh as she fell back against Klaus’s side. Then the mood grew sombre as she said, so quietly that Klaus almost couldn’t hear her. “I got into an argument with Allison this morning. She called me a monster. Or, well, she meant to. We were arguing about using our powers and how dangerous it could be sometimes, and she said that if I wanted to find a monster, I should look inwards instead of trying to blame everyone else. I didn’t even know what she meant. I wasn’t expecting it. I didn’t mean to offend her or anything. I think she just got mad at me. It’s alright, though.”

Klaus felt his body go cold. “Did she now?”

“Klaus, it’s nothing,” Vanya said as she felt his fingers still in her hair. “Really, I’m fine. I must have said something to upset her. Don’t make a big deal about this, alright? I promise I’m fine,”

There were a good many things that Klaus wanted to say to that, including that fact that he knew from experience that sitting in a bath full of cold water by yourself for hours never meant ‘fine’. “No promises,” he said instead. “You know I’m a bit of a drama queen. Are you alright to get yourself organized?” 

“Yeah,” she said as finally detached herself from Klaus’s side, a little reluctantly. “Thanks for coming to find me, Klaus. I appreciate it.”

“What else are brothers for?” Klaus asked as he stood. “You get yourself dried, dressed and presentable. Take your time, don’t rush for those fucks downstairs. But I’ll see you down there?”

When Vanya nodded, Klaus left the room as fast as he could, and it was only when the door was almost shut behind him that he heard the tell tail sound of Vanya standing from the bath. Ben was waiting for him in the hallway, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. His knuckles were spotted in ghostly blood. “How are you feeling?”

“Fucking furious,” Klaus replied as he stormed off down the hallway. “Follow me.”

Ben didn’t need to be asked twice and in record time, Klaus was close enough to his siblings to hear their banter from downstairs, and when he stomped down the stairs with the intention of drawing attention, and all conversation hushed as he stopped in the middle of the stairs. “Did you get her?” Luther asked.

“I did,” Klaus said, as he decided the rest of the stairs. “She was pulling a _me_.”

“That could mean so many things,” Luther screwed up his face.

“Moping in the bathtub about the woes of the world,” Klaus elaborated, and Luther nodded his understanding and turned back to staring blindly at the back wall. “I saw Lenoard, too, the bloody bastard. But Ben took care of him right quick. But Allison? You need to apologise to her for what you said.”

The room suddenly fell silent. There was no sound of Five flicking through the newspaper, or Diego tapping knives and forks together impatiently, or Allison’s nails tapping on her phone, or even Luther’s heavy breathing. They all turned to face Klaus as he touched down on the ground floor. “I beg your pardon?”

“Did you or did you not say that Vanya was a monster?” Klaus asked, and beside him, Ben crossed his arms. 

Allison fell back into her chair as all the colour left her face. “No I- I didn’t mean it like that. She just said-”

“It doesn’t matter what she said, or what you said,” Klaus interrupted. “I love you both, but right now, Vanya’s the one who’s carried it with her all day while you’ve forgotten about it. So you need to apologize for whatever the hell you said. Alright? I’m not mad, just disappointed.”

“But Klaus-” Allison protested.

“Why is this even a discussion?” Luther interjected, and the whole room settled into shocked silence. Even Allison looked amazed. “Just say you’re sorry and move on. I know that you probably didn’t mean to hurt her, but you did, and that’s what matters here, not your ego. Say you’re sorry and move on with your lives.”

Diego elbowed Luther in the side, raising his eyebrows, his empty stomach momentarily forgotten. “Look at you big man, siding with someone other than Allison for once in your life. You’re finally coming up in the world.”

“They grow up so fast,” Five joked, somewhat satirically, before he turned back to the newspaper. “Or so slowly, in your case.”

Ignoring them, Luther slapped away Diego’s hands that tried to dig into his skin and refocused on Allison. “Apologize. It won’t hurt. Just get it out of the way and then we can go back to playing happy families again.”

Allison looked like she was going to object, not about having to apologize, she was bigger than that, but about meaning to hurt her sister in the first place, but was interrupted by the bathroom door opening and closing downstairs. Ben, standing at the foot of the stairs, pushed Klaus forward, “Go sit, she’s coming!”

Klaus shot forward and slunk into his seat faster than he thought possible, and when he got his bearings, he pointed a threatening finger at each of his siblings in turn. “You didn’t hear that from me. Don’t you dare tell her, or I’ll have Ben tear our your eyeballs and feed your bodies to that tentacle beast in his chest.”

Nobody had the heart to protest despite how absurd the threat was, because Vanya’s footsteps were descending the stairs, and in no time she was standing there in her most boring button-up shirt and her long hair a little damp, averting her gaze. “Hey, guys,” she said shyly. “Sorry, I’m late. I didn’t uh, I didn’t expect you to wait for me.”

“Of course we waited for you, Vanya. We weren’t going to start without you,” Diego said kindly, doing a full one-eighty from before, but nobody mentioned it. “You’re f-family.”

She smiled at him as she walked towards the table and slid into the seat at the head of the table directly opposite Luther, unconforatble and awkward with all the attention before Allison stood up and turned to her. “Vanya, I’m sorry for what I said. I didn’t mean to offend you. I would never call you a monster because frankly, that’s just not true. I was just trying to say that your abilities are so much more powerful than mine, and I could only ever imagine what that could be like, and how hard it would be to control, especially after living without them for all your life. It didn’t come out the way I wanted it to, and I’m so sorry that I upset you. I love you, and I would never mean to hurt you. Ever.”

Vanya was silent for a few long moments, staring down at her plate with her hair masking her face, and Klaus wasn’t sure that she was going to speak at all. But then she looked up with a smile, something rare that Klaus hadn’t often seen, and it was like the room could breathe again. “It’s alright, Allison. I forgive you.”

Relieved, Allison sunk down into her chair as everyone exchanged glances with Klaus while Ben looked on proudly in the corner. Five, on the other hand, folded his newspaper up and put it aside. “Right,” he sounded bored. “If we’re all done with this nonsense, then maybe we can move onto more important things, like lunch.”

“Eat up, children,” Grace laughed from her place in the corner. “Your lunch is getting cold.”

“Thank fuck,” Diego groaned, and it was safe to say that he was the first person to reach for the trays laden with food. “I’m s-starving!”

Amongst the commotion, Klaus glanced over at Vanya, who smiled at him with a gentle, knowing smile, and that was all the thanks that Klaus would ever need.

**Author's Note:**

> It just made sense for Klaus to see Leonard, you know?? He sees the victims of the people who killed, right? LIke all those people with Cha-Cha and Hazel? In my personal canon, he sometimes sees the ghosts of Luther, Five and Diego too. It made sense to see Leonard, especially because he's the first person Vanya ever killed. Right?? I mean, there were the guys in the carpark when they were being beat-up, but I think Leonard was more personal.


End file.
